The wizened mage rolled his eyes to the sky. ‘Oh, dear Ascendants. Just get rid of them! Push them away. Whatever.’ He fluttered a hand to the door. ‘Demonstrate to me that you are worthy to be shown the secrets within.’
Tayschrenn blinked blearily in his exhaustion, taking this in. Of course I’ve driven them off before! Many times! But they’d just returned. Again and again. Like a stinging cloud of insects. Yet this mage claims this would be the last time … Very well. I’ll drive them off all right!
As more of the pursuers appeared, he drew down far into the depths of his Warren to summon every bare remaining scrap of power to thrust it outwards in one last great surge. He stored it momentarily, feeling it gnawing within at the lineaments of his flesh like a fire, then released it in a sudden surging blast of might that shot outwards like an eruption that seared across the Warrens.
He opened his eyes, blinking. The little mage now stood pressed up against the sturdy iron-bound door, a hand at his forehead. ‘Well,’ the fellow managed, his voice shaky and hoarse, ‘that was something.’ He waved to the sky. ‘Behold.’
Tayschrenn glanced about; the skies were clear of pursuers. Like summoning a gale within the Warrens, he’d driven them away. Just how far, though, he couldn’t say for certain. They may be gathering themselves to return this very moment – or perhaps not.
Kellanved gestured invitingly to the door. ‘Impressive. You may pass within.’
He eyed him sharply. ‘Not as a prisoner?’
‘No. Not as a prisoner, I assure you.’
Somehow, he didn’t think much of any assurance coming from this fellow, but he did burn with curiosity. The legendary Azath! What an opportunity! ‘Very well.’
The supposed elderly mage opened the door and waved him in. He entered a touch tentatively, still wary despite his wonder. Kellanved pushed in behind him.
The door slammed shut of its own volition.
*
‘The battle appears to be relenting,’ Nedurian pronounced – purely for form’s sake, as no doubt both Agayla and Nightchill had sensed this long before him. They nodded, kindly refraining from telling him to shut up.
The strange woman, Nightchill, whom Agayla had warned him to regard as pretty much an Ascendant, had been sitting atop a tall boulder, and she climbed down now, in a rather ungainly manner. This awkwardness suggested to Nedurian the suspicion that perhaps she was not entirely familiar, or at ease, with the form she currently possessed.
‘Resolution has been reached,’ she announced. ‘Though what form this has taken I cannot say for certain. I suspect—’
Her words were cut off abruptly as a shape swiftly rounded the boulder and something punched into her body. Nedurian gaped, horrified to see the bloody length of an enormous sword blade standing from her chest.
From behind, a man peered over her shoulder, all iron-grey hair and beard, lined savage face and sneering lips. He pointed past Nightchill to Agayla, shouting, ‘Make no move, witch! Or she dies.’ He spared a glance for Nedurian. ‘Or you, legionnaire. This is between me and her.’
Horribly, the blade twisted then as he turned it within Nightchill, and the woman shuddered, still conscious, still standing. The man returned his attention to Agayla. ‘Or your mistress!’ he warned. ‘I see her there, watching. Interfere, T’riss, and you are next! I, the High King, so swear!’
‘High King no longer, Kallor,’ Agayla grated, visibly shaking with rage.
Kallor barked a harsh laugh. ‘What matter circumstances? We speak in timeless truths now.’ He set his lips close to Nightchill’s ear. ‘Why not employ your witchery to blast me to cinders or crack me to shards? You are inestimably powerful. So very much more powerful than I. Why not?’
The blade twisted again and Nightchill gurgled her agony, rising up on to her toes. Blood marred her lips, bubbling. Nedurian cast a pleading look to Agayla but the sorceress shook her head.
‘Why not?’ Kallor raged. ‘I will tell you why not! Because I have been preparing for this, Sister. Ages ago – ages and ages – I purchased a rare ore mined in a land far away. A kingdom’s ransom it cost me. And I dusted it upon this blade just before I plunged it into you. A pinch. Just one tiny pinch. But it constrains you now, doesn’t it? Now you will be the first to feel the full weight of my judgement. And your damned brothers will follow! Damn you for interfering with me! Damn you for ever!’
He grasped a handful of her hair then, yanking her head high and exposing her neck. ‘Your kind are notorious for the difficulty of dispatching them – but I know of one sure way. A good clean beheading always does the trick.’
Nedurian lurched forward then, no matter Agayla’s objections, but in an instant Kallor had yanked free the blade and set it to Nightchill’s neck. ‘Think again, legionnaire! I will free her head from her body.’
‘You’re going to anyway,’ Nedurian growled.
‘Yes. But do you want to be the immediate cause?’ He backed away, half dragging the wounded Nightchill before him. ‘By the sea, I think. And I shall cast your head to the fishes…’
A strange thing happened then: ropes, or lines, or tangled netting, leapt up and lashed themselves about Kallor’s arm and neck to pull him backwards. He flailed, snarling, but the sea-wrack snatched him with a great yank and the heavy bastard-sword went flying from his grip. Nighchill collapsed and Nedurian and Agayla ran to her.
Nedurian cradled the poor woman’s shoulders. Amazingly, she was still conscious, and she fought to turn her head – to turn it to the shore where this Kallor fiend now flailed amid a lashing mass of twisting seaweed-draped old fishing netting and ancient grey lines, perhaps old forgotten rope from centuries of fishing.
The netting was dragging him, bellowing and struggling, down the strand to where a small skiff waited, pulled up on the gravel. To one side stood what appeared to be an old fisherman in tattered worn canvas jerkin and trousers, pipe in mouth. He was gesturing with his hands, making weaving motions, even as Kallor flopped up over the side of the skiff.
‘I will slay you too, you damned interfering old bastard!’ Kallor was yelling now, hoarse. ‘Sister!’ he called, ‘I will find you again! And when I do I will destroy you! I, Kallor, do so swear!’
The seamed, sun-darkened old fisherman pushed then, with his hands, and the skiff surged out into the surf, rising and falling as it crested waves, diminishing into the distance.
The fisherman took his pipe from his mouth. ‘You are not welcome here, Kallor Eiderann Tes’thesula,’ he called to the surf. ‘Each time you rise so too shall you fall.’ And he set the pipe back into his mouth, nodding to himself, and came up the shore to where Nightchill lay in Nedurian’s arms.
All this was astounding enough to him, but to top it all off Agayla then knelt to one knee before the old man, saying, ‘We are sorry, Fisher. We did not mean to disturb you.’